This disclosure relates generally to online systems, and more specifically to presenting video content to users of an online system.
An online system allows users to connect to and to communicate with other users of the online system. Users create profiles on an online system that are tied to their identities and include information about the users, such as interests and demographic information. The users may be individuals or entities such as corporations or charities. An online system receives content from various sources, such as users and advertisers, and selects content items from the received content for presentation to its users. The online system presents content items to various users by the online system to encourage user interaction with the online system.
Many online systems present content items to their users via a feed of content items (e.g., a newsfeed). For example, an online system presents a newsfeed to a user that includes advertisements, stories describing actions performed by additional users of the online system connected to the user, and content provided to videos posted by additional users of the online system connected to the user. To diversify content presented to the user via a feed of content, an online system may enforce limitations on types of content presented in a feed of content item. For example, an online system limits a total number of video content items included in a feed of content items or limits a number of video content items having certain characteristics included in a feed of content items.
If a user of an online system interacts with a video content item presented in a feed, an online system may infer the user has an interest in additional video content items, such as video content items having similar characteristics to the video content item with which the user interacted. While the online system may identify additional content items having matching or similar characteristics to the video content item with which the user interacted, enforcing limitations on the number of video content items included in the feed may prevent a conventional online system from including the identified additional content items in the feed. Omitting the additional video content items from the feed may reduce user interaction with the feed, which may impair subsequent selection of content for presentation to the user by the online system.